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Voice Plus allows Google Voice users to send SMS through any app, now available in latest CyanogenMod nightlies

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Google Voice has always been a great service (even if no one outside of America has had the chance to use it yet), but it’s been held back by a couple of shortcomings. One of the biggest shortcomings was its inability to facilitate SMS through other apps.

Whereas Google Voice enjoyed seamless integration with the core operating system for making and receiving calls, SMS required you to use the Google Voice app (and MMS is still a bit of a mess). If you’re a CyanogenMod user, that is no longer the case. The team has merged its “Babel” code into the project as “Voice Plus,” and with that, we get the ability to send SMS messages through Google Voice accounts using virtually any SMS app we choose.

This feature should be showing up in the latest nightlies as of July 22nd. Those of you who prefer stable and milestone builds will have to wait, but we imagine it won’t take long before we get a major revision to add this (and other features) to the ROM. If you’re feeling a bit adventurous and are willing to put up with a few bugs to try out the latest features, head to Get.CM and find the nightlies for your device.

[via Google+]

Quentyn Kennemer
The "Google Phone" sounded too awesome to pass up, so I bought a G1. The rest is history. And yes, I know my name isn't Wilson.

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18 Comments

  1. I’m generally happy with the stock Galaxy Nexus since it gets updated quickly, but something like this might make me switch. I know when I installed my first ROM on my Droid I was sorry I had waited so long, and that might be the case of I put Cyanogenmod in my Nexus, but if there a possibility of this coming to stock ROM users I’ll likely wait.

    It’s stuff like this that really highlights Google’s lackluster effort with Google Voice.

    1. they are working on it for hangouts if im not mistaken.

      1. They are, but this works perfect right now. I have FINALLY switched my VZW number from Facebook and Twitter because this supports Short Code.

  2. Nice, I’m not a fan of CM but I can’t wait until others bake this in their ROMs. I’m usually running Pacman or Beanstalk on my Nexus. I can’t wait for them to bake this in.

  3. Any app that helps me pay Verizon less is a wonderful thing.

    1. Except they charge for data… so unless you’re on WiFi then SMS over Google Voice will likely cost data. Unless it’s still using the SMS network? In which case it’s no different than regular SMS.

      1. Here’s how Google Voice is working for me right now. If someone sends a text to my Google Voice number, I get a message on my phone. It’s like some 10+ digit number. But it’s ALWAYS the same number. So I can save that number in my contacts. I’m using my stock messages to send Google Voice text messages.

        Also, when I get the message, it’s either, “xxx-xxx-xxxx – Text message” or “Contact Name – Text message”.

        In Google Voice you just have to turn on receive messages in your phone.

        Oh, and I’m on Tmo, so no Sprint Google Integration. If there’s on thing I miss from Sprint. LoL!!

        1. There’s a (maybe useless) petition to get T-Mobile to enable conditional call forwarding so we can then use Google Voice. Sign it! :) — http://www.change.org/petitions/t-mobile-allow-conditional-call-forwarding-for-prepaid-accounts

          1. Call Forwarding doesn’t work with non-contracts. So of what I heard.

            However, I just modified the Call Forwarding settings in my phone to Google Voice. LoL!! Like just hit menu under your phone app and change the call forwarding numbers to your Google Voice.

            And if someone calls my Google Voice number, it calls my phone anyways. But integration isn’t needed for that.

            So my voice mails get redirected to Google Voice. LoL!! But I can sign, I guess. =.P

          2. Bwahahahahaaa!! You were the most recent signature. 4 hours ago. =.P

          3. Teehee. I had meant to sign it when I first switched to T-Mobile a month ago and realized I couldn’t use Google Voice anymore, but didn’t. Your post reminded me, so I signed before suggesting it (else I’m a hypocrite :))

        2. That’s how it works for me at the moment as well, in addition to the Google Voice app, but is that what Voice Plus is doing? I’ve been using that method for a while… so I fail to see what’s new here. Are they just internally keeping a record of which number is linked to who and filtering out the number from the SMS message itself? or is it like a bridge between SMS and Google Voice over WiFi?

  4. How about a hack that allows MMS???

    1. Working MMS is such a terrible hack, I’m surprised it ever worked :)

      http://www.nowsms.com/faq/how-mms-works

    2. You already have MMS. It’s called Gmail.

      1. Gmail can send a picture message to a persons cell phone number?

        1. It can send a picture to a person’s email app on their smart phone. I know there are still people w/feature phones, though I’m guessing few of them read phandroid. But smart phone to smart phone, the obvious way to send pictures is email. Google obviously didn’t care to cater to the dwindling few who can’t access email on their phones. Anyway, once they integrate Hangouts w/Voice this MMS issue will evaporate.

          1. Part of the good thing about GV is the privacy issue, what if you don’t want someone knowing your email address?

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